Holden's trip in Modern China (Adopted by The Catcher in the Rye)
by langlangxiao
Summary: Holden Caulfield, came to Modern China in a research program, especially designed for adolescents. Holden witnessed the heavy smog in Peking, experienced the hard life of remote villagers, and he was also touched by the story of one American university graduate who had similar growth experience. Finally, Holden returned to his family and his society physically and spiritually.


The story is a continued ending of _The Catcher in the Rye_, in which Holden stayed in Modern China for a while. Please read it and offer your comments.

It was the summer vacation for school kids when Holden finished his psychiatric treatment in the hospital. His parents, particularly his mom, felt guilty for failing to find out his son's problem earlier, whilst at the same time, was wondering how she could get Holden back to school soon. She went to consult an adolescent psychology expert who coincidentally was an American Chinese elderly gentleman. Hearing the Holden's story, the expert asked Holden was interested in the research program that the expert did conjointly with Chinese educators in China. The program was carried out in response to one widespread social problem amongst Chinese adolescents in urban cities in the 21th century. A proportion of urban adolescents were reported to be living in their small world, isolating themselves from the real outside world. With numerous experiments, researchers and educators finally found out an effective way to get these kids back to the right track of social life. Participants were provided opportunity to experience the ideal life they were dreaming of. In most cases, the life experience turned out to be transformative and more persuasive than any lessons given by parents or teachers, since adolescents learned to reflect on their former life after they acted as the ideal role in real life. Holden was looking forward the experiential trip to China, because he was planning to live somewhere out west where it was very pretty and sunny and where nobody would know him and he knew nobody.

Holden's first stop in China was Peking International Airport. He was thrilled to find a Chinese gentleman who was holding a big board with "Holden Caulfield" on it. After greeting each other, the young man told Holden he was called Ming and would accompany Holden during his trip in China as his interpreter and guardian. As Ming spoke English without much accent and Holden did feel bad about Ming. Rather, Ming reminded Holden of his elder brother, D.B. Before Ming and Holden went out of the terminal building, Ming handed a medical mask to Holden. Soon, Holden found surrounded by thick fog and nothing was visible twenty yards far off. It was not like eight o'clock in summer time, his watch said it was though. Holden became excited, since he had not seen such heavy fog all his life. Holden suddenly thought of tap-dancing that he was doing before Stradlater in that boarding school. Ming seemed to read Holden's mind, and he warned smilingly "Holden, it is not a time to dance now. It is smog, not fog, and you know, it is very, very bad for your health." At that point, Holden felt lucky not to live in this city all the time, or the smog may kill him and at the same time, he felt sorry for the people who were surrounded by the terrible air.

On the way to the hotel, Ming drove slowly and told Holden his own growth story. Ming was growing up in an upper class family in China: his father was a high-rank official and his mother was a successful businesswoman. In Ming's memory, his parents sacrificed free time for extra money, so they did not spent much time with Ming. Ming spent his childhood with his grandparents, and then he received the best school education in the most prestigious boarding school – Beijing International School. Ming was considerate of his parents' hard work and worked hard to fulfill the great wish his parents set on him – outstanding academic achievement. However, a family disaster became the turning point of his life. When Ming was in the 7th grade, his father was announced to life-long jail because of bribery. What's more, his father confessed he accepted the bribery merely for Ming, since he planned to send Ming to study abroad later. Ming said he would never forget that moment when he heard his father's confession, because the confession hurt Ming deeply. On one hand, Ming felt shameful of his father, because his father the fame of all his family members. On the other hand, Ming hated himself, since he was unknowingly the criminal motive of his father. Ming said the great image of his father collapsed within one second and so did Ming's dream. Once life became aimless, Ming was not in the mood to study any more. Instead, he started to leap out of school to play computer games in public computer bars, since he could experience the sense of achievement from online games. Due to too much course absence and failure, he was asked to have one-year leave from that school. At that time, his grandparents made a big decision that they would take Ming back to the remote mountainous area where Ming's father was brought up. The grandparents hoped that the experience could evoke Ming's love for his father and cheer Ming up to work hard toward his dream. "Then what happened?" Holden could not help asking when Ming stopped all of a sudden. Again, Ming grinned with a sunny smile, "you will find the answer yourself when we arrived at our destination. Have a good rest, you know, tomorrow we will drive to the village my grandparents took me to 15 years ago, and of course the situation there is much better than before."

Holden talked with his parents and his sister Phoebe about his experience that morning over the Skype, and was amazed to find they were all listening to him very carefully. After the online chat, Holden recalled the happy time the whole family spent together, and he suddenly came to realize his parents were always devoting a lot of time to their family. For example, his parents, opposite to Ming's parents, never worked on weekends even if overtime salary were provided, they would take their kids to trip around instead. Before learning about Ming's story, Holden used to take his parents' love for granted.

The next morning, looking out of the hotel window, Holden had a great view to overlook the city, for the smog had disappeared. At that moment, Peking City looked very similar to New York City with so many skyscrapers and cars along the streets. Of course, Holden did not see such a big water area as the Madison River in NYC. When they finished breakfast at the hotel, Ming drove Holden to a nearby Macdonald, and ordered some hamburgers to take away as Holden's lunch. To Holden's surprise, the customers in the store were all young people, dressed in a very fashion way. Therefore, Holden started wondering what the countryside would be like in China.

The trip to the target destination was not as exciting as Holden expected, as there were endless uneven roads and big green mountains. Therefore, when Ming asked whether Holden would like to share any story, Holden was glad to tell all his story, even with more details that he provided to readers than he did in that hospital. Later, Holden expressed his appreciation for Ming's patience, and referred to Ming as the best listener he had met in the world. "Don't forget that I was once in your shoes." Ming responded. Before Ming introduced the schedule for the physical experience in the destination. When they arrived at the village, Ming led Holden into a shabby but clean house, and there Holden met Jie who would be hosting Holden in the next two weeks during Holden's temporary residence of the house. Jie was fifteen, but much shorter and thinner than Holden. Seeing Holden, Jie showed a very big smile, and said "hi" in English, before he volunteered to the back yard to get vegetable and fruit for Ming and Holden. Holden was happy that Jie was able to communicate with him basically in English.

After the meal, Jie cleaned up the table and dishes very efficiently, and made the stone bed for Holden. Holden did not feel sleepy at all, instead, he was so anxious to learn how Jie could manage to live alone. Jie was very open to the questions Holden asked. Here was Jie's situation: His parents were currently doing construction work in a southern city. Ming told Holden his parents would come back to see him once a year, because they were trying to save every penny. Jie's grandparents both died of cancer five years ago, and the cancer treatment brought the family into debts (most people in the remote countryside had no medical insurance). Indeed, Jie's parents had sold out all the valuable stuff in the house, and there was no furniture but some ugly stuff made by Jie and his father. Jie was studying in local school which was located one mile away. Holden felt something striking inside his heart, a sharp pain. He spoke out his pain frankly: "I cannot figure out why your parents do not take you along with them?" Jie smiled lightly, "I understand their situation. If I were in the city with them, they would spend money on my tuition and apartment rental, and that expenditure was too much to our family. What's more, I like my current school very much." "In this way, how did you think of your grandparents, troublemakers?" Holden continued to ask, because the critical situation seemed to be caused by Jie's grandparents. "No, of course not, you see, I love them, and we five were living together before they passed away. Actually, I missed them all the time, because I was thinking of the happy time we spent together, especially when I was alone." Holden was dumbfounded to hear Jie's response and was upset to see Jie's gloomy expression when Jie was mentioning "we five". At the same time, Holden feel guilty to call his grandmother who sent him money four times a year for his birthday gift "lavish" or "old as hell". Holden started admire Jie as a superhero, since Jie never complained of his hard situation, instead, he was optimistic. No wonder Jie was able to do good job in his study and in the household work as well.

Early next morning, Holden was woken up by the chips of chickens and ducks, only to find Jie had got their breakfast ready, which included porridge and boiled eggs. Jie looked at Holden, full of care in the eyes, "are you sure you can walk with me to school after the meal?" "What?" Holden could not believe his ears, "there is no school bus?" "No." Jie shook the head calmly. Holden was not a lazy boy, and he was planning to try out walking to school in the countryside as the experience was totally new to him. Along the way to school, Jie was describing everything they saw, and even elaborated on the description whenever Holden need more explanation. In Holden's eyes, Jie was not an adolescent, but a qualified farmer, since he was well knowledgeable about the farm work. When asked how he was able to balance the schoolwork and so much farm work alone, Jie said he valued the opportunity to receive education, and in particular he was eager to become another "Ming" who had devoted to the education for the local kids. When it came to Ming, Jie's tone was full of admiration and he told part of the story that Holden had no access to from Ming himself.

Fifteen years ago, Ming came to the village with his grandparents, and he hated the country folks at the very outset. From Ming's perspective, the villagers were poor, ignorant and worst of all, they were caring about Ming's business excessively. For example, whenever they had some new eggs or fresh vegetables, they would bring them to Ming's grandparents, of course, with their coarse voices echoing around the yard. That scene always reminded Ming of people who came to his parents' house to bribe his father. His grandmother warned Ming not to think low of these people, because they were sincere, hospitable and kind.

"Your father could not have gone to college without the financial aids from the poor villagers. Unfortunately, he seemed to forget the villagers' help after he proudly became the first college graduate in this area, and he even avoided meeting these people. Now your father regrets to death not to have contributed to the local education."

In addition to the moving stories told by his grandmother about the villages, Holden felt he was surrounded by the sincere care of the people all the time. Holden enjoyed living with these people, because he even started to appreciate the "coarseness" of these people as "natural".

Extensively obsessed in the story told by Jie, Holden did not realize how long they had walked before Jie pointed at a two-story building which was surrounded by green crops, "Look, here is our school. It is bigger than most schools around, because it includes nine grades, while other schools are either elementary school or middle school. You know, the school was designed by Ming and constructed by the local villagers nearby." "Say again?" Holden could not believe his ears, "Ming designed your school? He told me he was an English teacher in your school." Jie opened his mouth big and he blurted out, "you seemingly do not know this school was invested by Ming's family. Then have you ever thought how you could have access to this school?" Before Holden responded to the question, he found they had come to the school gate, which had a bronze plate on the top that said "Education Is the Wing of Your Dream" in both Chinese and English. Instead of continuing the topic regarding Ming, Holden was hasty to find which part of the building was named after Ming, since building wings or even chairs in his school were named after the people who donated. Just as Holden was looking around, suddenly he caught sight of Ming who was standing at the building entrance, greeting teachers and students. Later, Holden learned the rest of Ming's story. That is, Ming was greatly touched by the innocence and sincerity of the villagers, and he was also was hurt by the poverty of these people. Ming told his grandma he would do something rewarding to improve people's life, and the first thing he could do was to pursue his study. He went back to Peking and started to work hard at his courses. Finally, he was admitted by a college in the U.S. with full scholarship and his major was architecture. He chose architecture primarily because he had planned to design beautiful houses for the villagers. However, during his stay in the U.S., he realized that he was not able to afford a new house for each household. He started to reflect on the root for these people's poverty, which he found later was the lack of education for generations. In this sense, Ming decided to contribute to the local education of that village. Six years ago when Ming graduated from university with his master degree, he talked with his mom over his wish to set a school to provide free nine-year education to local kids in that area. Given the ups and downs the family had experienced, his mom was very supportive and soon invested a large sum of money in that local school. Ming's enthusiasm was responded to warmly by other educational volunteers and local government. With joint efforts, the school was initially a distinctive one from other public suburban schools. For example, this school provided English education at the first grade, and it had close relation with some national research centers that focus on troubled adolescents. Ming said that his school was open to the poor kids who expected to change poverty situation through schooling, and also to those urban adolescents who had lost their aims temporarily. In Ming's eyes, the experiential experience in the poor area would give the urban kids the best lesson which they could never learn from the textbooks in the city. The school turned out to be successful in achieving both the two aims he harbored. Local kids were working hard at their courses and their parents started to find jobs in the city with the dream to be able to pay the tuition to their kids' college. Indeed, after the 15-day stay with Jie and other school kids, unexpectedly, Holden come to value his parents' hard work and he understood why his parents always wished him to go to the first-class university, he didn't share the same idea, though. Compared to other peers in China, he came to see the better social environment he was enjoying. Actually, what the kids had dreamt of was what Holden had in hand. Luckily, Holden said to himself, "better late than never and I really need to start over.", before he waved goodbye to his Chinese peers in his returning trip to the U.S., physically and spiritually.


End file.
